New trailer for Steve McQueen’s Shame starring Michael Fassbender

November 17, 2011 - By Liam Goodwin

Fox Searchlight has released the second US trailer for Shame, which reunites Michael Fassbender with British director Steve McQueen, who directed the actor in Hunger. It tells the story of Brandon (Fassbender), a single man who is addicted to sex in any form as long as it does not involve love or intimacy. His ordered lifestyle is thrown into chaos with the arrival of his needy sister (Carey Mulligan).

Watch the trailer, which features Mulligan singing “New York, New York” in the background, below:

In a unique move Fox Searchlight has embraced the NC-17 rating given to it by the MPAA in the US. The MPAA states that the rating “does not mean ‘obscene’ or ‘pornographic’ in the common or legal meaning of those words” but it “simply signals that the content is appropriate only for an adult audience.” Usually such a rating would be the death of a movie commercially, but Fox Searchlight president Nancy Utley told The Hollywood Reporter they’ll be wearing it like a “badge of honor” and due to the “sheer talent of the actors and the vision of the filmmaker” they’ll be giving it a big awards push over the upcoming months.

The film premiered at The 68th Venice Film Festival in September and Fassbender won a Volpi Cup for best actor, so he and the film may have a shot.

Shame will be released December 2 in the US, and January 13, 2012 in the UK.